Something Left to Burn
by Foolscapping
Summary: Someone has it out for the Winchester brothers. It doesn't end well. For them. (DARKFIC)


**Warnings** for heavy character death, violence, murder, revenge. Not a pretty read.

Not a happy ending. Probably one of the more hideous things I've written in my career of making horrible things.

I'm a stinker I know. **I'LL WRITE A FLUFFY SHIP THING OR SOMETHING NEXT, I PROMISE.** ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

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 **She finds and kills the tall one first.** It's easy enough to capture him because he seems to know her (does know her), seems to think she's not a threat (knew she wasn't a threat). By the time she's shot him in both legs and he's leaving slippery trails of blood as he crawls toward his duffel, she's already straddling his stomach and bringing the knife down into his chest; she doesn't want him to suffer for _too_ long, because this is strictly business with his brother — he's just unfortunate payback, long arms flailing to grab at her while wide, wet eyes roll from the untouched bag on the bed to her face. Her stomach twists. There's something deeply regretful there, but she couldn't — she wouldn't let it throw her off. She wouldn't ruin this opportunity, three years in the making.

"You didn't _stop_ him," she says, trying to keep her voice level. "You didn't stop him and now I've lost everything. And now he's going to lose _you_."

The one called Sam twitches, consciousness fading. Her heart is pounding wildly. This is the death of a human. He breathes raggedly as he paws at her, and gurgles, "I'm _soh_ —I'm sorry—"

Tears fill her eyes and she puts her hand over his mouth, blood and spit smearing as she snuffs out anymore words; maybe he's too tired, fading too fast, to bother grabbing at her red fingertips. Memories flood her mind of _smaller_ hands grasping for her and reaching only empty air, a face pleading with her. _For_ her. _**Save me. Save me, please,**_ they had said. Sam, though — Sam is simply **_forgive me_**. Then he goes still finally, hair stuck to his turned face, and she wipes the knife down and works on pulling the corpse to lay across one of the beds. He's so heavy, so limp. There's red everywhere. She's not sure if she can do this.

She sits on the edge of the bathtub, the top of her gun sitting gently against her forehead as she practices her breathing exercises. In the other room, Dean is finally walking in. He's in the middle of ranting about some fast food joint down the street, and from what she visualizes, he's likely not even paying attention that first moment as he closes the door behind him. But then — the frozen silence tells her he's finally spun around to see the blood-spackled room. To see the pale, dead brother with half-lidded, sincere (empty) eyes. A bag drops, she can hear. Probably food. She stands up, listening to the rush of a body as it catapults across the room, nearly slams into the corpse. She visualizes Dean grasping at Sam, trying to see where the blood is too little too late.

"Sam — oh, _fuck_ , god, no — Sam, no, **_nono_** — "

It's a thick voice, throat lodged with emotion. She finally steps out and sees for a moment that Dean's hands are on Sam's cheeks. Tears are in his eyes. He's pale. Stricken.

 _Good._

When he looks at her, there is a _rage_ within his grief that could wash the whole room out with red; she wouldn't have even had to bother making a mess. But the rage dissipates. Confusion and hurt and pain coils behind a green-eyed gaze, because he knows her, and it makes her so tired and angry and broken down to know that on top of everything else.

"L… _Lisa_?"

She cocks her gun, aimed and ready as she crosses the room.

"It's all your fault," she nearly whispers, voice gone. "You did this. Do you know I watched them kill him? Did you know that I lost everything? My son… my burned down the house. They left nothing at all." A pause. "And I lost my memories; the ones you wiped out. Did you… seriously just… think you smoothed it all over? You keep your time with me, while I stumble along in life with a chunk of my past scrubbed away?"

"Lis, please… "

She shoots him in the leg, too. She's got good aim now. He grits his teeth, biting his lip enough to bleed as he stumbles backward. Even now, he's got one hand on Sam's chest, like he still has some kind of chance at defending his brother. Maybe he's just thinking wishfully, because tears drip freely now, and surely Sam's still heart has something to do with that. She bites, "Shut up. You fucking… You erased everything about us! About what you did! About the demons, the danger… Didn't I get a _say_ in it?! They told me _everything_ , Dean. You wiped everything and walked away! You stole any chance I had of protecting myself from those things." She shakes her head. "Did you even consider they'd come for me someday, and I wouldn't even know they _existed_? They came after me because they knew _you_. They thought I'd know where you were, you know? But I had no clue who Dean Winchester was. I had to look around long and hard to even know why they took me and Ben in the first place."

"Ben — " Dean rasps.

" — is dead," she finishes. "And your brother is the trade. Tooth for a tooth. And when I handle this? I'm going to wipe out as many of those demons as I can."

She considers for a long, long moment, that maybe she should plant one bullet straight through the middle of Dean Winchester's eyes. After that… _well_. She's learned about hunting enough. She's re-learned some things. Muscle memory even helped with the feel of the gun under her fingertips. It came a bit naturally, and with nothing left to fight for… Lisa thinks maybe now that she's got blood on her hands, she might as well let _this_ world engulf her completely.

But… Would it not be a mercy, to snuff Dean out right now?

She lowers her gun. "At least you'll have something left to burn," Lisa says, nodding to Sam. "If you ever want to come for me next, Dean… Well. You remember my name. Now we both have equal ground to stand on."

And then, with Dean's shell-shocked stare on her, she turns and walks away. She doesn't look back, even as Dean aims his gun at her, hands quaking. Maybe he loves her. Loved her. Either way, he turns from her and clings to that poor sad body laying crookedly across the stained sheets instead.

 _Losing the one thing you needed most… and then living on without it… it's as worse as dying,_ she thinks. It's _worse_ than dying.

She gets in her car, fires up the engine, and drives seventy-five down the highway, blood under her nails and tears dripping softly down her skin. There's a small group up North a few states away, willing to give her some information on vampire lore and comprehensive guides to demons and angels. She can continue learning. Build off it. Kill every black-eyed thing crawling around out there in their flesh suits. She couldn't go back to living like a normal person. Not after what she had seen. Not after Ben.

When she sleeps tonight, she swears she smells the scent of blood, whiskey, and burning wood. Only, there was no body to burn for Ben, and there was no whiskey or gun oil to be breathed in.

She hears Dean's voice from a time long passed, whispering softly to her, "Good night, Lis." There's nothing else. There's nothing at all. She stares at the picture of Ben on the motel's old nightstand before she drifts off to sleep.

 _'_ _It's okay, Ben. It's okay. Just look at me.'_

 _'_ _I'll ask one more time — where is Dean Winchester?'_

 _'_ _I told you! I told you I don't know who that is! Please. Please,_ ** _please_** _.'_

 _'Wrong answer.'_

Lisa wakes up, her shrill scream locked only in her thoughts.


End file.
